Kira at Work

I take Kira to work with me and she is an absolute angel. At practice she stays in my baby bjorn and you wouldn't even know she was there. She lays in my fold out chair and enjoys her days at swim meets. It is fun to just have one on one time with her to hold and smile at in between races. Here are a couple of kids at our last meet at UOP. This is the pool where I went into labor with Scott. One of the moms commented the other day about what an awesome job to be able to bring an infant to. So true. Scott lived on the deck until he just wanted to dive into the pool. I really am blessed with such a great job that allows me to be mom during the day and coach at night. I love what I do and feel blessed to be part of such a great team!

Monday Artwork

Scott really likes doing art projects and creating things. He likes painting, coloring, playing with play-doh, cooking and anything he can work on. Here were his two projects for the day.

The bishop project. Yesterday we got a new Bishop. Bishop Bohne is such a great man and has an amazing wife. He is going to do a great job leading our ward family and I couldn't think of a more perfect bishop for our ward. Anyway, this morning Scott was wondering whose house I was returning books to and I told him, "the new Bishop". When we left he said out of no where, "mommy, we need to write the bishop a letter and tell him how much we love him." I am sure the idea came from church yesterday when Scott wrote a letter to the old Bishop telling him thank you for being his Bishop. So we got home, I printed out a paper that said, "I am grateful for....and Scott wrote "My Bishop" with the p the wrong way. I love when kids are learning to write their letters. It is so cute how they write and try so hard. He drew a picture of the street and the temple for him which were such cute ideas. He loves drawing temples probably because he likes building them with blocks. On the back I asked him what he wanted to tell the Bishop and he said, "Bishop, Thank you for being my bishop. I love you Bishop. Perro, that means dog. That's it. Love, Scott." How cute and funny is that!! Perro??...Where did that come from? When I repeated Perro my son corrected my accent. How funny is that. He than told me he could teach the Bishop Spanish if he needed to learn. Luckily, Bishop served his mission in Peru.

He learned the letter "R" in joy school.

Boys 1st Teeth Cleaning

Scott and Tyler did a great job getting their teeth cleaned. They were actually jealous when it was the others turn and wanted it to be their turn. The perks of having your daddy be a dentist is getting your teeth scaled in bed. I don't think the bed provides great ergonomics for Dan. Here are some before and after shots.

Harrison Birthday Party and More on Scott's Emotions

Harrison turned 4 and we celebrated at the park. Harrison is such a great friend to Scott and Laura is such a great friend to me. We really are so lucky to have such great friends!

The past month, I have come to terms that Scott is going to have one emotionally traumatizing experience a day. Understanding him has been on my mind lately. He found a rolly-polly, let a friend take care of it and it accidently went home with her. Mommy lesson #1...when Scott asks me to take care of his animal, I will not suggest he find a friend to pet-sit. My brilliant idea backfired. He is my very emotionally sensitive child. We continue to work on learning to deal with gigantic emotions. Danny said the stage might end in his 20's when it ended for him. Sad, but true. Danny has the McMillan trait of being a sensitive person which Scott acquired. Two worlds and families collide when you get married. I tend to be the child of New Yorkers. I think, "that is no big deal" when everything is a big deal to him. I am learning to think differently and try to be sensitive to his needs. When Danny and I pray about helping these emotional moments we feel just to love him. Love is truly to cure to all!

Being emotional isn't a bad thing. After the party Scott, Tyler, Kira and I sat on a blanket under a tree for over an hour which rarely happens. We had no distractions and "relaxed" as Scott quoted. It was so nice to talk and enjoy each other. Scott was so cuddly and loving. Each night Scott loves me to lay in his bed. He tells me how much he loves me, "I love you as much as the water in the sea or more than the stars in the sky or as much as the tallest building." It is very cute and he is very creative. Tonight he asked when I was going to have another baby and I told him not until he wanted and probably not for a while. He said he wanted another baby now because he loves Baby Kira so much and she is so cute.

I blame his over-sensitive self lately on her. Change isn't good for any four year old. He is a great brother but holds things in. He worries about Tyler so I try not to talk about health issues around Scott. I can't imagine how he internalizes everything with Danny, Carl and Tyler. The little man has been through more than most people go through in their lifetime watching Danny in bed for 3 months and in pain everyday, Tyler's surgeries, me dissapearing during them, and Carl dying. Scott gives me the best hugs and kisses and always wants me to be happy. Today I was telling him how lucky he was to have such a great teacher at Joy School and what a good mommy Tara is to Jack and he said, "yea, but you are the best mommy." How quick your children are to tell you that they love you and love you being their mom. And that makes life as a mother all worth it.

Finally Swimming Weather

My sister joined Woodlands Pool this year so we all went over to enjoy the semi-nice Memorial Day Weather. We are looking forward to many days at the pool this year. Hopefully it will get warm soon. The weather in May would be 70's one week and cold and rainy for two weeks which was starting to get depressing. Tyler swam with Danny and talked about going swimming with Daddy for about three days afterwards. He usually gets too cold, but the water was nice and warm. It took Scott about 20 minutes to get used to the water again and before I knew it he was showing me his big arms, jumps and breathes. Roman loves the water and I had fun dunking the little man under the water and seeing him come up with a smile on his face.

Kira's Smiles

This little bundle is melting our hearts. As soon as she sees us in the morning or wakes up from her naps she gives us the biggest, warmest smiles that fill us with joy. It is as if her whole self lights up with happiness. She opens her mouth wide, squeals this happy, tiny, high pitched little squeal as if saying "I love you and am so happy that you are my parents." The bottom picture shows how her smile takes over her entire body. It is so fun to see her and Danny together. They look so much like each other. I love it!! We love her!! She continues to be such a sweet, easy baby. She really only cries if she is hungry, tired or needs to be changed. She is so quiet, such a little girl and so petite. She has such a sweetness about her which I love.

IUD SURGERY

They found my IUD in the posterior cul-de-sac which is an open cavity on the posterior side of the uterus; in the picture is the bottom portion between the uterus and rectum. Luckily nothing shows signs of perforation. I got there at 915AM, they admitted me into pre-op around 10 and I went into surgery about 1245PM. There were a lot of morning emergencies. I was hoping they could give me a sedative, but it is too painful and laborious to breathe with the CO2 gas pumped into your stomach. Fentanyl was give and I remember being in the OR for about 2 minutes before falling asleep. I woke up fairly easily. They needed to remind me to take breathes which wasn't too difficult and I was happy everything went well and my reproductive system looks intact. My throat hurts to talk from intubatation and I am pretty soar in my stomach. I get necks and shoulder pains from the CO2 gas. The surgery took about 1.5 hours and I was picked up at 4:30pm by my sister. Thanks so much to everyone who offered to help!! I couldn't have done it without Peggy who took Kira and my dad who took the boys!! I am sure I will be relying on many friends in the next couple of days to get through this. Can't lift much and hoping to feel better in a couple of days. Birthing is an easier recovery for me than this IUD surgery. I am grateful for the surgeons and staff that was so kind to me. Here are some pictures that they took during the diagnostic part of the surgery...

I still can't believe how easy it is to do surgeries laparoscopically. It blows my that they can make two tiny incisions to diagnose and take out organs and other materials. Without medical advancements they would have cut me and now I miraculously have two little incision scars. It is amazing!! The same is true with caths for Tyler. They can do small procedures or diagnoses on Tyler through his groin instead of opening up his heart and it just amazes me.

On another note, when my nurse asked about my religious affiliation, I told her LDS and she talked to me for about an hour about religion. It was strange how many similarities we had. Her mom was catholic, dad lutheran, we went to St. Matthews growing up and she just went to a Mormon Singles Dance. Her family are all different religions and we talked a lot about faith. It was a nice distraction. She was so nice!! She was really impressed with her family members that are mormon and what the church has done for them. It made me reflect on how grateful I am for my ward family and faith. One thing she mentioned was how at the dance everyone was asking what ward she was in and she felt a little like an outsider. I can see how she felt that. I know it isn't the intention of anyone, but it is hard when it seems like everyone knows each other.

IUD in posterior cul-de-sac

liver and gall bladdernormal appendix
left ovary
Right Ovary
Uterus
IUD out